Blackberry Z10, Q10 Launch Date, Price and Tech Specs

The long-awaited launch of the BlackBerry Z10 smartphone delivering the new BlackBerry 10 operating system in the United States is just around the proverbial corner. The handset is rumored to be officially announced and launched at the Mobile World Conference (MWC) mobile consumer electronics expo in Barcelona, Spain at the end of February. An agreement with AT&T is pretty much a foregone conclusion, as that wireless provider in the US has a good history with former BlackBerry smartphones and mobile handsets.

But the handset is also going to be carried by Wireless providers Verizon Wireless in the US, who recently stated the Z10 will retail for $199 with a two-year contract. Verizon will also offer the BlackBerry Q10, but did not quote either a release date or retail price. Sprint Nextel has been quoted as planning for a Q10 launch in April of this year, again with no price or specific date given. T-Mobile will debut the BlackBerry Z10 on March 27, and AT&T confirmed what was already expected when they said in a recent press release that they will sell both the BlackBerry Z10 and Q10.

AT&T did not list a specific date or price for the handsets, and there are a few significant differences between the two highly anticipated smartphones. The Z10 boasts a 4.2 inch multitouch IPS LCD display and no physical keyboard, with an extremely high pixel density of 356 pixels per inch. Display resolution will run 1,280 x 768 pixels, and the handset is powered by a dual core 1.5 GHz Snapdragon S4 processor. The Q10 delivers a smaller display at 3.1 inches, and that Super AMOLED screen offers 720 x 720 pixel resolution and 330 pixels per inch. A dual core 1.5 GHz CPU is on board, as is a physical QWERTY keyboard.

The BlackBerry 10 operating system will power both handsets, and you can expect around 10.0 hours of talk time from a single charge. The camera packages on both handsets is identical, with an 8.0 megapixel camcorder joining a 2.0 megapixel chat cam. The chat cam offers video call support and 720P HD video recording with a 3X digital zoom. The rear facing camcorder supports autofocus, delivers a 5X digital zoom and LED flash, and records video in 1,080P HD resolution.

Both the BlackBerry Z10 and Q10 smartphones offer 4G LTE and HSPA+ support, and are also backwards compatible to with 3G networks. Support for global roaming is on board, and NFC wireless connectivity is present out-of-the-box. Both handsets can also function as a Wi-Fi mobile hotspot for multiple wireless devices.